


Friendship is a Dirty Word

by vands88



Category: Daredevil (TV), Jessica Jones (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Claire Temple Is Sick Of Your Shit, F/F, Femslash February, Friendship, Jessica Finds It Hard To Make Friends, Jessica Jones Is An Asshole, Jessica Swears A Lot, POV Jessica, drinking buddies, fuck buddies, implied Claire Temple/Matt Murdock, implied Jessica Jones/Luke Cage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-12
Updated: 2016-02-12
Packaged: 2018-05-20 00:24:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5986099
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vands88/pseuds/vands88
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'd make a shitty friend, if that’s what you’re after.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Friendship is a Dirty Word

**Author's Note:**

> this started out as porn but ended up at FEELS #sorrynotsorry
> 
> unbeta'd - if you see any mistakes, let me know!

Jessica admits it; she flirted with Claire the day they met. It’s her natural instinct when someone hot walks into her life: flirt a little, drink a little, normally fuck more than a little. But there was also a lot of shit going down that day. Killgrave, for one, and Luke passed out on her bed for another. What a goddamn mess. 

Months later and life’s levelling out again. Not necessarily in a ‘good’ way but in a ‘level’ way… like, the road’s still going to hell but at least you’re not gonna break your ankle in a pothole on the way. It’s not enough to make her sleep at night, but paying clients offer both money and distraction, and with Killgrave out the picture, she can stand on her own two feet without dreading every minute that he’s gonna tear her back down. It’s enough. 

She rounds off the last bottle of whisky in the house and drops it on the desk beside her crossed legs. The sound rings empty, and the hollow glass stares back at her. Even the apartment building is strangely quiet tonight in the dead of winter. Most people went home for the holidays. Luke went out of town months ago to repair whatever was left of him after she fucked up his life. Even Trish has her new talk show that’s currently filming out of the city. It’s fucking miserable. So, of course she’s remembering the one time she sat here while a hot nurse stroked her thigh… of course. 

She sighs at her own patheticness; getting lonely on a winter’s evening when it was herself that pushed everyone away. “Only got yourself to blame, Jones,” she mutters as she kicks off her shoes and makes her way to bed. 

She drags every blanket she owns over to the bed and kicks at the heater for all the good it’ll do, and between shivers and nightmares, she eventually gets some sleep. 

-

Jessica checks her messages at about one o’clock the following afternoon, with the phone cradled between her cheek and her neck, and a slice of fresh pizza dripping from one hand.

Malcolm’s gone to see his parents for the New Year, so she has to go through the desperate pleas for help one by one, until she gets bored, and just picks whichever one is going to involve the most punching. She’s almost reached that stage yet again when a familiar voice speaks:

“Hey - uh, it’s Claire. Claire Temple. I don’t know if you remember me, I’m the nurse that helped your friend… and, huh, I’m guessing that’s not very specific for you, but, er…” She sighs. “I could pretend I’m calling for business, but, truth is, I just wanted to ask how you were. I saw the news and, er, I guess I just wanted to check in. See if you were okay. So… hope you’re okay.”

Jessica falls back in her chair, dumbfounded. Claire’s halfway through reciting her number when Jessica realises she should be writing it down. 

She stares down at the scrap of paper with the digits on. Now what? Call her and say, “oh, yeah, still an alcoholic with PTSD, but thanks for asking.” Seriously, how are you meant to respond to a message like that? She groans as she screws up the paper in her hands, and bangs her head against the desk as the scrunched paper ball makes contact with the trash can.

-

She nearly changes her mind ten times that week, sometimes even pulling the paper out of the trash can before throwing it back in. Thankfully, a distraction arrives in the guise of a drugs case, which, lucky for her, involves a lot of therapeutic punching. 

She must get beat though because she finds herself waking up in a hospital. Again. 

She groans. “Again? Seriously?” She reaches for the IV in the arm and yanks it out unceremoniously.

“I could say the same to you.”

Jessica looks up to see a very pissed-off looking nurse with her arms folded and her eyebrows raised in disapproval.

“Claire,” she sighs. “I’m okay, I promise. It just got a little out of hand.” 

“You’re telling me. Eyewitnesses say it was you versus _fifteen_ guys.”

“Was that all?” Jessica mutters, continuing to untangle herself from the bed.

“ _Fifteen_ -”

“So the gang was a little larger than I expected.” Jessica says as she picks up her jeans from the chair and slips them on under her gown. “I stopped the trade. I got paid.” She shrugs. “What does it matter?” 

Claire grabs her arm. “It matters because no matter what kinda gifts you got it’s still a shitty idea to knock your brain around like that. You’ve at least gotta stay so we can check you don’t have a concussion.” 

Jessica looks down at where Claire’s holding her, and tears herself away. “Right, because you’re gonna stop me?” 

Claire takes a deep breath, like she wants to argue, but then she shakes her head, bites her lip and steps away, arms raised, defeated. “Right. Sorry for giving a shit, I guess.” 

She doesn’t even look at Jessica as she walks out the room. 

“Fuck,” Jessica mutters. 

She looks down to where her hand was fisted around the bed frame and sees indentations where her fingers had been. “Fuck,” she says again. She grabs her leather jacket from the back of the chair and gets the hell out of there. 

-

Claire’s _nice_. That’s the goddamn problem. No one’s _nice_ in this city, and if they are, you can be goddamn certain that they’re doing it to steal your wallet. Being a dick is like an automatic defense system for Jessica. And it’s not like Claire didn’t know, right? She told her she was an asshole the day they met. 

“Goddamn it!” she shouts in frustration, much later, as she pulls her hand out from her pants after half an hour of _nothingness_. She rolls over to face the ceiling. She’s feels too damn guilty to even wank. That’s when she knows it’s gone too fucking far. 

She lies awake for forty more minutes before muttering, “fuck this,” and tossing the covers aside. 

-

She rings Claire’s doorbell three times in quick succession, hoping that 1am isn’t too late for a booty call. Shit. _A call_. Just a call, no booty. Just… _fuck_. 

The door opens. “It’s 1am.”

“Yeah,” Jessica brushes off. “I’m an asshole.”

Claire folds her arms, and leans against the doorjamb. She’s in a dressing gown. Who even owns those things? “Yeah, you are.” 

She should have seen that coming. Jessica tries again, “I mean, I’m sorry for _being_ an asshole. You’re nice, but I… well, I guess I’m not used to nice. I’d make a shitty friend if that’s what you’re after.” 

Claire raises an eyebrow. “Who says that’s what I’m after?” 

Jessica opens her mouth but finds that no words come out. She closes it again. 

“Relax. I’m just sayin’ you seem like a good person when you’re not being an asshole.” She smirks, and then sobers again real quick, her head tilted to the floor. “When I called you, I’d just found my friend… your sort of friend… lying in a ditch somewhere. Half-dead. I just… needed to know that not everyone I patch up out of hours is as reckless as he is-” 

“But I didn’t call you back-”

“And then I found you in hospital with your head smashed in.” 

“Shit,” Jessica says. “I’m sorry. I’m an asshole.”

“So you said.”

Jessica huffs. “How is your friend?” 

“Alive. How’s yours?” 

Jessica cringes at the memory of Luke’s anger. “Gone.” 

“Gone?”

“I, er-” she stumbles, and has to breathe a few times to be able to say it, “I told him to leave.”

“I’m sorry,” Claire says, her face crumpling in sympathy. “I was there when he… I didn’t think he’d be gone for so long. But maybe he just needs time, you know?” 

“Don’t,” Jessica says with an annoyed headshake, “Don’t try to make it better. You don’t know what I did.”

“No,” she says, “I don’t.” And she pushes open her door. 

An invitation. 

“You sure you wanna do this?” Jessica asks. “I wasn’t kidding about being a shitty friend. My track record is… Well, there aren’t enough people left for me to _have_ a track record.”

Claire just steps back, opening the door wider. “I’ll take my chances.”

-

Claire gets out a bottle and they drink until it gets easier to talk. They don’t talk about the big stuff, instead that swap work stories about idiots and laugh until their throats ache. 

“-so I told the guy,” Claire says between chuckles, “that ain’t what vibrators are for.” 

Jessica’s crying with laughter, her lungs ache with the struggle for oxygen. She doesn’t remember the last time she laughed so hard and for so long before tonight.

Dawn is beginning to peek through Claire’s curtains as Jessica laughs into her shoulder. 

Claire yawns, her arm brushing against the back of Jessica’s neck. “I should go to bed.” 

Jessica tilts her head against Claire’s chest, and tipsily looks up at her through her lashes. “Okay,” Jessica says, but she doesn’t move.

Claire smiles, like she knows she’s being watched. It’s so beautiful, Jessica has to move the lock of hair that impedes the view, and then Claire meets her eyes. Jessica doesn’t let go. She twirls the strand of soft hair around her finger, and lets the heat build, until she doesn’t know who it is that moves first. 

She cradles Claire’s face as their lips meet, fiercer than she expected, but the taste alcohol-sweet. Her hand pushes into her hair, and Claire groans when Jessica rakes her fingernails ever so gently against her scalp. 

They’re so close already that Jessica only has to shift a leg slightly to fall straight into her lap, and Claire wastes no time in grabbing her ass and pulling her closer until they’re flush against each other. 

“Thought you were going to bed,” Jessica teases as she feels Claire’s fingers toying at the base of her tanktop. 

“Thought you were going home,” she replies, contradicting her speech by pulling Jessica in for another searing kiss. 

“Think we can still make good on at least one of those,” Jessica mumbles against her mouth. 

Claire nods, so close, that the movement brushes Jessica’s nipples through the fabric. She inhales sharply at the contact and tugs at Claire’s hair in compensation. 

Claire more or less growls at the sensation and then hauls Jessica over to the bedroom, stripping clothes and kissing new exposed skin as they go. They fall onto the bed in a tangle of limbs and half-hung clothes, and they don’t leave it again until Jessica’s made Claire curse and scream in three different languages. 

Afterwards, Jessica rolls over and grins at the ceiling, feeling wonderfully smug. 

“Shut it,” Claire mutters into the pillow.

“I didn’t say anything!” 

“You’re grinning loud enough to hear,” she says, and then proceeds to hit Jessica with said pillow. 

Jessica laughs again as she gets a mouthful of feathers, and wrestles the pillow from Claire’s grip, leaning over her again. “Alright, I’ll say it once and then shut up: that was awesome.” 

“Good,” Claire smirks. “Now go to sleep.” She steals her pillow back, and nestles into it. 

“Sure I can’t tempt you for round four?” 

“I'm sure,” comes the muffled reply. 

Jessica laughs and rolls back over. She’ll wait for the endorphins to wear off and then she’ll make good on her promise and leave, but for now, she’s fucking radiant. 

-

It’s midday by the time she makes it home and microwaves a crappy burrito for sustenance. She doesn’t do anything for the rest of the day, and it’s evening by the time she checks her calls, flicks through her post, and actually deals with the crappy parts of life again. 

That’s when she finds a postcard from Luke. And, half an hour of sulking later, she’s come up with a plan. 

She doesn’t wait for Claire to make a move, not after she made all the rest of them, so Jessica goes to her apartment, and when she’s not there, goes to the hospital. 

“You’re really easy to find you know,” Jessica says, leaning against the wall as Claire studies a file against the nurses’ station.

Claire smiles the kind of smile that spells both surprise and affection. “Is that a good thing?” she asks, tucking the file under her arm and turning to Jessica.

She shrugs. “Depends. Good for me, but also good for bad guys. Maybe just don’t go making friends with bad guys.”

“I’ll do my best.” 

An awkward silence falls over them, long enough that several people bustle past them, and then, embarrassed and hurriedly, they both speak simultaneously: 

“Didn’t think I’d see you-” 

“I was hoping we could talk-” 

Claire tilts her head, studying her. “Sure, yeah, we can talk.” 

Claire leads her into a room that’s obviously just been vacated; the sheets are askew and a glass of water still sits on the cabinet. “I’ve got five minutes.”

“That’s all I need,” Jessica says. “I don’t want to make this weird.”

“That makes two of us,” Claire says, folding her arms. Then, she seems to think better of standing still and starts to tidy the room after the last patient. “So, what? ‘Last night was great but not again?’ I kinda figured that when you left. Nice of you to tell me in person though. For an asshole, that sure is not asshole behaviour.” 

“No, that’s not really… I mean, thanks. But, that’s not really what I was going for.”

Claire drops the pillow she was fluffing. “Oh.” And then, “You’re here about work then? You need help or-”

“No,” she interrupts. And cringes. She’s so bad at this. “Look, we’ve both got complications in our lives, right?” she says, hands in her jacket pockets still as she waves her arms to indicate the people not present. “People we care about. But they’re not here, or whatever. And I dunno about you, but this town can be real crappy sometimes, so maybe it’s good to… you know. And I know I said I’d make a shitty friend. But I’m kinda wondering if you wanna hang out anyway…” she trails off, embarrassed, kicking at the ground. Then she smirks, and adds, “And, maybe, fuck sometimes too. Just because what we did was too fucking good not to do again.” 

Claire laughs soundlessly, and steps up to Jessica. It takes a moment to gather the courage before Jessica raises her head to look her in the eye. Claire is biting her lip, clearly thinking this over, and those ten seconds drag through Jessica’s stomach like razor blades. 

Finally, Claire nods, her teeth still making an indentation in her lip that makes Jessica want to push past it with her tongue. “Okay,” she says. “Friends that fuck.” 

“Drinking buddies that fuck,” Jessica corrects. “I told you, you don’t want to be my friend.” 

Claire rolls her eyes, and then acquiesces, “Sure, _drinking buddies_ that fuck,” she says, but in a tone that means she not buying it at all. 

Jessica huffs and lets her have it. She doesn’t even argue when Claire kisses her goodbye. 

-

New Year’s Eve finds them wasted on a rooftop, the sun long since set, passing a bottle in a paper bag back and forth, and watching the fireworks explode from the parks all around them. 

It’s cold as fuck, but Jessica doesn’t feel it, watching the gunpowder make patterns in the sky with her friend tucked close beside her.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, and Happy Femslash Feb! Hopefully I've got another F/F fic on its way to celebrate buuuuuut it's being difficult so we'll see. I am also on [tumblr](http://vands88.tumblr.com/) if that's your thing. :-)


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